1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an optical connector for use in the field of optical communication including equipment carried on board a car, OA (office automation) equipment and public welfare equipment.
2. Background Art
When drawing out an optical fiber code from the rear portion of an optical connector, in case where there exists any obstacle in the rear of the optical connector, to keep away from the obstacle, the optical fiber code must be bent and lead to the lateral side of the optical connector. In this operation, in case where the optical fiber code is bent suddenly, the bent portion of the optical fiber code causes a large light loss and, therefore, it is necessary to prevent excessive degrees of bending of the optical fiber code.
In conventional optical connectors, generally, a boot member made of rubber or plastic material having a given degree of elasticity is placed on the leading portion of the optical fiber code to lead from the optical connector, thereby preventing excessive degrees of bending of the present leading portion.
In this case, the boot member can be elastically deformed to such a degree that the optical fiber code is not allowed to bend excessively and, therefore, the leading direction of the optical fiber code from the optical connector can be adjusted easily.
However, on the other hand, since the leading direction of the optical fiber code is not fixed, for example, in case where an optical connector is connected to its mating optical connector in a narrow pace, the leading direction of the optical fiber code must be corrected and adjusted properly so that the optical fiber code leading from the rear of the optical connector can be prevented from interfering with other parts, which results in the poor connecting operation efficiency.
In view of this, there can be expected a structure in which the boot member is made of high-hardness material such as ABS resin to thereby fix the leading direction of the optical fiber code. However, in this structure, because the leading direction of the optical fiber code is fixed, the leading direction of the optical fiber code cannot be adjusted according to the installation place of the optical connector, which is practically inconvenient.
In an optical connector disclosed in Japanese patent Application, first publication No.Hei10-78534 (JP-A-10-78534), a protection member corresponding to the above-mentioned boot member is rotatably mounted on the rear portion of the connector housing of the optical connector, which makes it possible to adjust the leading direction of the optical fiber code.
However, in the optical connector disclosed in JP-A-10-78534, since the leading direction of the optical fiber code can be changed in a state where the protection member has been mounted on the connector housing, there is a possibility that the leading direction of the optical fiber code can be changed due to some external impact or pressure and thus the optical fiber code can lead in an unexpected direction. In this case, when trying to assemble other members at the installation place of the optical connector, there can arise problems that the optical fiber code leading in the unexpected direction can provide an obstacle to the assembling operation and/or the present optical fiber code can be sandwiched between the members.